Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Oak Bay Deer Booklet Distribution!

UPDATE: 2nd distribution session on Saturday, March 1st from 12-4pm - come to our table in front of Oak Bay City Hall to get booklets, and select your neighborhood for dropping booklets in mailboxes - we need bodies to complete this project!

We'll have maps, and you can pick a neighborhood in Oak Bay, or get assigned one, and help ensure every home has one! It'll be a fun wander around the streets, bring your family and dogs! This will go a long way to helping people understand how we can coexist with deer, and prevent the proposed deer slaughter.

Thanks for your feedback and compliments - we've had several people edit the document, but things always slip through the cracks. Please email me your corrections, and we'll update the digital version, and future printings.

I'm not happy with the cull, but your booklet is pretty much useless. By your standards I am indirectly feeding the deer because I have a garden, one that cannot be fenced (30 deg. slope) which Campbell River friends found is the only real solution, and which puts paid to your suggestion of using a dog to keep the deer away. And I get the sense that they are expanding their culinary repertoire.

The problem is, unfortunately, that there are no predators except careless drivers here in Oak Bay, and down here the in south the adult deer are far more aware of traffic when crossing a street than the average teenager. The result is that more deer are living long enough to reproduce and make Oak Bay their home.

I've watched it happen: people laughed at my mother when she said she saw deer back in 2000 and when we saw our first cluster of three shortly after moving in here in 2007, the neighbors didn't believe us until we sent a photo. By 2012, one doe with single fawn dined and chewed their cuds our back yard; 2013 two does with a total of three fawns took turns. The number of bucks who are regulars is also increasing. And the level of vegetation, both in gardens and on the slopes too steep or rocky to garden (you will have guessed we live on a hill) is slowly diminishing.

I reiterate: I don't like the idea of a cull, but somehow the deer population in Oak Bay has to stop growing.

Thanks for writing - we do offer more solutions than just 'build a fence'. Have you tried flood lights, or playing a radio quietly on a talk station? Being on a slope might be more of a challenge, but it's not an impossible situation i'm sure. Maybe other readers might have suggestions as well!